San Francisco Scoping Wave Energy

Australian ocean energy company BioPower Systems announced it reached an agreement with the city of San Francisco to explore wave energy technology.

“The feasibility of ocean waves as an energy source is being considered and this could lead to further project development,” said John Doyle, acting manager of infrastructure at the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

BioPower will work with the San Francisco utility to examine the feasibility of a project site 5 miles off the coast of California. The project could generate between 10MW and 100MW of power, the company said.

The BioPower wave system, bioWAVE, generates 1MW of energy per unit. The company said it would install several units at an undersea wave energy farm that is out of view and environmentally friendly.

San Francisco and BioPower are working to bring wave energy to the power grid by 2012 pending results from a feasibility study.

“We have already assessed the potential for economic energy production using bioWAVE at the proposed project site, and the results are very promising,” said Tim Finnigan, chief executive officer at BioPower.

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